Category: France

We made a few trips over to the UK to get some proper South African camping kit for Battutah. A 1.6 metre Eezi Awn roof tent and a 50 litre National Luna fridge freezer were first up. Cold beer and a comfy bed….nice start! A few other odds and ends necessary for camping including a brush up on our African French and before you could say Stoney Tangawizi we were on a ferry to France. The plan was to tour the D-Day beaches, Brittany and anywhere else that took our interest.

Our first night abroad in Battutah looked like this. This over-landing suited us…

We continued on and decided to go to Mont Saint Michel in Normandy. By all reports to looked fantastic with it’s Benedictine Abbey at the peak of it’s island. But we arrived to this…

We muddled through it as best we could (before nearly blowing our tops) to investigate the winding streets and medieval architecture.

Over the next few days we wound our way down through Brittany staying in some fantastically quiet camping spots. Very quite but windy, very windy. As we had gone as far south as we hoped we decided to head for the Loire Valley and Saumur. A down right gorgeous town with its massive château that looks out over the whole town. It was here that we spent the remained of the holiday as we just needed to stop. Have croissants delivered to the car, drink tasty coffee, sample the Saumur Champigny and generally live it up and catch up on some well deserved rest. There was even a pool nearby and a delightful classic French restaurant nearby. Just what we both needed

Battutah was practically problem free, apart from a minor dual battery electrical issue (of my making!). Travelling at our own pace again in the way we wanted felt like putting on an old pair of slippers – comfortable and warm…